In Cuba, whose cigars are considered the best in the world, these sheets, with a thickness ranging from 0.3 to 0.7 millimeters, are used to wrap cigars individually inside a metal case or separate them into boxes, the publication said.

Thanks to his ingenuity, he added, a Cuban entrepreneur managed to set up the only private company on Cuba that sells the thin cedar sheets to wrap and preserve the country’s famous cigars, thus saving on import costs.

“Laminados Concepción” is a local producer and the State’s only supplier of these fine sheets for its famous cigars. This factory, with some 15 workers, saves the country a million dollars a year in imports, according to Alexis Concepción, 56, owner of the thriving business.

The warm, sweet aroma of cedar pervades the shop, located in the tobacco-growing municipality of Cabaiguán, 380 kilometers east of Havana. Long sheets of wood hang on clotheslines waiting to dry for the making of the sheets.

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